When you are dealing with 1.2 million cases to be delivered every week, it is vital to know that they are going to the right places, especially when there is a choice of 2750 delivery points. In addition, of course, the trailers have to be secure both when in transit and when loaded and waiting for delivery. To meet this challenge, Nisa-Today’s, which is the UK’s leading buying and distribution company for independent retailers and wholesalers, has installed an integrated security and logistics system from Unisto.
The project initially started as a need to increase security. The company had been using padlocks to secure the trailers but there were problems with lost keys, matching keys to locks, etc. but more importantly there was no way of knowing what exactly happened if something went missing or was stolen. To address this, the company fitted Unisto’s electronic RFID seal, the Crypta® Data Tag, to each of their trailer units.
The seal works by automatically generating a four-digit random number every time it is closed and also records the time and date of each opening and closing, storing details of the past operations in its memory. Thus, at any time, the integrity of the load can be verified by checking that the original seal number from the initial loading operation is unchanged. The life expectancy of the unit is several years depending on the operation usage pattern, enabling it to easily pay for itself compared with the costs of disposable seals.
“We fitted seals to our fleet of 150 trailers,” explained Jeremy Blakey, Director of Re-Vision Logistics, which is co-ordinating the project. “We now have a precise audit trail that shows exactly when any seal was opened so any suspicious incident can be pinpointed in time and tied into the tachograph information to give the location of the vehicle. Drivers particularly like this as it provides independent proof of their integrity and honesty. For example, we have had a couple of incidents and the Crypta seal data enabled us to completely rule out the drivers as having any possible involvement.”
The collection of this seal data is done automatically as the seals have built-in RF transponders that link into Unisto’s GateSuite software. The seal transmission is automatically read as the trailer passes the gatehouse, transmitting its trailer ID and memory, including the current seal number, which is then displayed in the GateHouse software running on a PC. This screen shows the name and picture of the driver, the run number, the vehicle i.d., and status of the load, i.e. automatically verifies the transmitted seal number with the one entered on loading. This makes it an easy process for the guard to visually verify the driver and vehicle number against the screen information to ensure that everything correlates and the load is secure. The whole process takes a few seconds rather than several minutes. As a result, there are no long queues of vehicles waiting to enter or leave the depot, which would eat into drivers’ allowable driving time and cost fuel whilst the engines were idling.
The RF link also enables the load security to be maintained whilst in the depot. Once loaded, the Unisto seals are secured and the trailers moved into parking spaces to await the tractor unit and driver. As the depot in Scunthorpe covers 41 acres, it would be a hard job to maintain a security watch on all the trailers even with the CCTV cameras that are in place. However, if any seal is opened whilst the trailer is parked, it sends an alert to the GateSuite system, via strategically placed RF readers, which are on a Wireless Network. GateTrak immediately flashes up an alarm on the display showing exactly which trailer is being opened and its exact location on the site. “You can never stop a determined thief,” added Jeremy Blakey, “but you can make it very hard for them to succeed. The level of security that this Unisto system provides is a powerful deterrent. Word has spread via drivers, suppliers, etc that we would not be an easy target.”
The GateTrak display also provides the real time status of each trailer displaying which are on site, which are loaded and which are empty giving total visibility of everything that is going on. As the status is colour coded and displayed on the PC screen, any problems regarding late departure are immediately apparent so that remedial action can be taken at once. Prior to this new system, a comprehensive overview would have been impossible without sifting through numerous pieces of paper. The precise time that the trailer is opened and closed at each delivery is also used to provide actual-time, logistical information. This is compared against the routing schedule for that day to determine if there were any inefficiencies or problem deliveries such as a vehicle arriving at a delivery point and not being able to start unloading for some time. “The quality of this information is far superior to any other method of obtaining it as it is gathered automatically by the seals and fed into the system at the end of each day,” said Jeremy Blakey. “Any problems that day can be sorted before the next day’s run. With the Working Time Directive, we have to be sure that we are using the drivers’ working hours with maximum efficiency. And, naturally, we have to ensure that we effect deliveries efficiently especially as stores don’t have much storage space, so deliveries are on a Just In Time basis – any delays and they lose business.”
Jeremy Blakey concluded by saying that the Unisto system had delivered both security and increased operational efficiency 24/7. “It is unusual to have something that is universally welcomed throughout a company but I am particularly pleased that both the management and drivers think that the system is marvelous and beneficial,” he concluded.
Unisto UK office
Tel: 01483 209100
www.unisto.co.uk
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